Thursday, March 14, 2024

The Thames Torso Murders


 The Thames Torso Murders is one of the many adventures of Sherlock Holmes in my latest book, Holmes of Baker Street. In it, there is a character mentioned in one of the original stories by ACD. The story also has grisly elements (if you are into that sort of thing).


Here is the opening to The Thames Torso Murders.

In recalling the numerous individuals I have encountered in the cases I have shared with my friend Sherlock Holmes, there have been some whose very appearance has betrayed their baleful intent. 
    Readers of my memoirs may remember Dr. Grimesby Roylott whom I described as having a large face seared with a thousand wrinkles, burned yellow with the sun, and marked with every evil passion. He possessed deep-set, bile-shot eyes, and a high thin fleshless nose. Dr. Roylott succeeded in killing one of his stepdaughters and almost succeeded in murdering the other.
    Then there was the statue-smashing Beppo, who was absolutely simian in appearance and knifed a man on the street. 
    Who could forget the master blackmailer Charles Augustus Milverton whom Sherlock Holmes described as a slithering venomous serpent, with deadly eyes and a wicked face?
    Only after his crime was uncovered did Josiah Amberley’s true features reveal themselves. If I recall, I compared him to a misshapen demon with a soul as distorted as his body.
     Culverton Smith who killed Victor Savage and attempted to murder my friend Sherlock Holmes looked every inch the villain he was with a great yellow face, coarse-grained and greasy, with a heavy double-chin, and two sullen, menacing grey eyes.
     Finally, a man whose name will forever live in infamy, the late Professor Moriarty whom Holmes himself described as extremely tall and thin, with deeply set puckered eyes. His pale and ascetic-looking face oscillated from side to side in a curiously reptilian fashion.
    It is not always prudent to judge someone or something from its outward appearance, and so not all the characters we encountered lived up to their looks. Holmes once told me of the most winning woman he ever knew was hanged for poisoning three children for their insurance money.
    In our first encounter with Dr. Moore Agar, both Holmes and I believed he was some nefarious villain, for he looked the part, but of course, we were sorely mistaken.
    The same could be said for the aloof and taciturn Ian Murdoch of whom Holmes described as having some strange outlandish blood that was reflected in his coal-black eyes and in his ferocious temper, but he proved not to be the killer.
    Baron Gruner was a handsome man, with the ability to charm women, but both his good looks and charm hid the heart of an abuser and a murderer. 
    I recall it was in May 1887, when Holmes and I had finished our breakfast, and we heard a peal of the bell. This was followed by the light tread of footsteps on the stairs, a knock at our door, and Mrs. Hudson stepped into the room to announce a young lady was here to consult with Mr. Holmes.
    “What is your impression of the young lady, Mrs. Hudson?” Holmes asked, standing by the mantel, filling his after-breakfast pipe.
    “She appears to be a very fine and well-mannered young lady, Mr. Holmes.”
    “If she meets with your approval, please send the young lady right up, Mrs. Hudson.”
    In another minute, the woman was standing in our sitting room.
    She introduced herself to us as Miss Angela Moore. She struck me as a demur, attractive young woman, who could not have been more than two and twenty. Miss Moore had dark blue eyes, a delicate nose, a small mouth, and a lovely, unblemished porcelain complexion. She was impeccably dressed in a form-fitted, long-waisted purple dress with dark polka dots that displayed a fine figure. The dress had a modest bustle and not one of those fashionable bustles so large you could set a tea tray upon it. 
    I consider myself a particularly good judge of women, and even before getting acquainted with her, I had the strong feeling this young woman was the epitome of innocence that can be found in British womanhood. Her voice was the perfect pitch, not too high or low, and though she spoke softly, her every word carried gently to the ear. As she entered the room and stood before us, it was obvious the young woman was attempting to control some deep distress. 
    “Won’t you take a seat, Miss Moore,” Holmes said, motioning her to the basket chair.
    She sat and folded her hands upon her lap. Her lovely face reflected urgency, but she bore up under it with both a deep-rooted strength and a feminine vulnerability. “I have come to you, Mr. Sherlock Holmes, because I believe you are the only man in London, nay, the only man in all England who can help me, and I am sorely in need of your help.”
    Miss Angela Moore had spoken with sincere conviction. Her pleading was obvious, but not overstated. 
    “I am very willing to lend whatever help you desire, Miss Moore,” said Sherlock Holmes in a reassuring manner. “Pray, tell me your problem.”
    She took in two deep breaths and released them before she began her narrative. 
    “Have either of you gentlemen heard of the terrible, gruesome murders that the press has dubbed ‘The Thames Torso Murders’? Over the past several months, the bodies of both men and women have been found floating in the river. The bodies were discovered… with… without….” Here she brought a handkerchief to her mouth to stifle her anguish.
    “Calm yourself, Miss Moore,” said Holmes soothingly. “There is no reason to continue. I am well versed in the details as the newspapers have related them.” 
    Indeed, both Holmes and I had read with interest the news reports of these murders. The murder victims were found without heads, arms, or legs. The torsos were discovered in and around the Thames, some floating in the water, some at the water’s edge. Two amputated arms and one amputated leg were discovered about the same time; one arm had been buried on a construction site, the other two floating in the Thames. The murders, dating back over a year, were quite gruesome, and I shuddered to think of a fine young woman like Miss Moore even reading about them. She eventually regained her composure. 

All of Stephen Gaspar's Sherlock Holmes books can be found on Amazon!







Thursday, January 4, 2024

Sherlock Holmes and The Tired Captain


The Adventure of the Tired Captain is one of many stories referenced in the Sherlock Holmes canon. It is also one of the many stories in my latest book, Holmes of Baker Street. 


Here is the opening to The Adventure of the Tired Captain.  


In July of 1889, I was still settling into the role of being a husband to my bride Mary. Since my mid-thirties I had suspected that I just might remain a bachelor for life, for as Benedict stated in Much Ado About Nothing; ‘When I said I would die a bachelor, I just meant that I didn’t think I’d live  until I got married.’
  Married life was a considerable adjustment, especially for someone who had led a somewhat vagabond lifestyle. On the whole, I liked married life, and now for the first time, I was the master of my own home, which comes with its own obligations and responsibilities. It is a milestone in a man’s life when he begins to think of his legacy, how he plans to mark his life and considers what evidence he will leave behind to prove that he lived and accomplished something worthwhile. 
   Since my marriage, I had seen less of my friend Sherlock Holmes, who now usually contacted me only when a case came his way that he thought might interest me. 
    It was a rainy night in July. My wife and I were enjoying a quiet evening at home. After dinner, we retired to the sitting room as raindrops made pit-pat sounds on the window. I was reading by the lamp between our chairs. My wife was working on her petit point. A peal at the bell caused us to look at one another expectantly. The maid answered the door, I heard a familiar voice, then the sound of steps upon the linoleum. A moment later our maid, Mary Jane, ushered in Sherlock Holmes. We were both surprised and pleased to see him. He, in turn, greeted us warmly. 
   “Won’t you sit down, Mr. Holmes?” my wife offered. “Something to drink perhaps?”
  “No, thank you, Mrs. Watson, I am afraid I cannot stay,” he said with a hint of urgency. He cast me a sidelong glance. “I have a cab waiting.”
    My wife picked up on this immediately. 
   “I understand,” she said. “Well, John, you best put on your galoshes and take an umbrella from the stand.”
    At the door, she tied a cravat about my neck and kissed me goodnight. Holmes and I walked out into the rain and into his waiting cab. In the dim light of a streetlamp, I thought I saw a slight smile touch his lips. 
    “If it isn’t too presumptuous, may I ask where we are going?” I asked my friend.
    “Not at all. We are destined for the docks in the East End.”





Tuesday, November 7, 2023

Sherlock Holmes & Cliff's Edge

 The Mystery of Cliff's Edge is one of the many adventures of Sherlock Holmes in my latest book, Holmes of Baker Street. In it, we see a very unexpected return of a character from one of the original stories by ACD.

Here is the opening to The Mystery of Cliff's Edge. 

On a lovely September day in 1903, Sherlock Holmes and I were sitting in our Baker Street sitting room. I had taken up a position by the window and was reading Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness, while Holmes was rummaging through his files of past cases. We had been occupying the room for over an hour without saying a word, as befits two men of a long-standing friendship who were quite comfortable not having to spend every moment together filling the air with inestimable chatter. 

     I lowered the book in deep thought and gazed about the room.

   After several minutes, without any provocation of which I was aware, Sherlock Holmes said, “I certainly hope, Watson, that we have had a positive effect and or influence on the many clients and individuals with whom we have come in contact over the years on the cases we have shared.”

    I regarded my friend with astonishment. “How could you know I was reflecting on past cases and clients? I have been silently reading my book all this while without a word.”

    Holmes smiled and continued organizing his papers.

    “You were reading Conrad’s Heart of Darkness, which is I recall a man’s journey down a river in Africa. Something made you think of Afghanistan, and you turned to the skin of the swamp adder pinned to the wall, and then to the thin stick I used on it. Your eyes then rested on Sir Henry Baskerville’s muddy boot I keep as a memento atop the bookcase. Just beneath, on the top shelf of the bookcase is the old volume on the writings of Brother Thomas of Worms I received in the service of his holiness, the Pope. Then your gaze came to rest on the gold snuff box given to me by the King of Bohemia. You were obviously thinking of all our past cases and the many memorable characters. So, I ask again: do you believe our clients are better off from their experience with us?”

    It was a thoughtful question and one that had caught me quite off guard. I laid aside my book and considered Holmes’s question.

    “To be totally honest, Holmes, I have thought little of the lives of the characters, clients, and villains that we have encountered. I have, as you well know, recorded the events, but afterward, once the case was over, I gave little or no thought to those people we had met. But if I interpret your meaning, I have no doubt that most, if not all the people we have met have had their lives changed by our intervention. I am sure that Jabez Wilson is much more careful with the employees he hires, and does not offer too little pay, whereas Violet Hunter is wary of being offered too much. You saved James McCarthy of Boscombe Valley from prison, allowing him to marry Miss Turner. They are, I trust, enjoying a happy union. You also kept John Hector McFarlane from being found guilty of murdering Jonas Oldacre. Neville St. Clair is, undoubtedly, more at ease not having to live a double life. Helen Stoner leads a less fearful existence after her maniacal stepfather met his end. My old school chum Percy Phelps faced ruin and disgrace but was vindicated after you recovered the stolen treaty. You were able to prevent doomed marriages for two Violets: Smith and de Merville. As for Irene Adler….”

    I paused not knowing what to say, as I knew Holmes still held the lady in high regard.

    “I need not say more,” I said.

    “So, it is your opinion that our delving into the lives of these people has had a positive result?” he asked.

    “Don’t you think it has?”

    “Sometimes one never knows if other’s lives are better for having known us.” Here Holmes fell silent in thought. “Not all my cases have been successes, I’m afraid. I failed John Openshaw and Hilton Cubitt. We were not able to bring Victor Hatherly’s mutilator to justice, nor were we ever to bring Mr. Blessington’s executioners to stand trial for their crime. Do you remember The Cornish Horror? In that case, I was not able to capture the killer of the three Tregennises, nor was the killer’s killer brought to justice.”

    “That is because you decided to let him go.”

    “I still believe it was the right thing to do.”

    “Of course, you do. You do not shy from elevating yourself above the law.”

    “Let us not have this discussion again.”    

    Our conversation was interrupted by a knock on the door. 

    “Come in Mrs. Hudson,” Holmes called out. 

Stephen Gaspar's books can be found on Amazon.

Tuesday, October 24, 2023

Sherlock Holmes and The Abergavenny Murder

    In The Adventure of the Priory School (1904), Dr. Huxtable requests Holmes come to his school in Mackleton. Holmes shakes his head and says, “My colleague, Dr. Watson, could tell you that we are very busy at present. I am retained in this case of the Ferrers Documents, and the Abergavenny murder is coming up for trial.” 

Now fans can discover the mystery of The Abergavenny Murder in Holmes of Baker Street.

Here is the opening to The Abergavenny Murder.

If there was a man who had earned the reputation as the foremost expert on crime, that man was, indeed, Sherlock Holmes. The London detective would have been the first to admit that this distinction was only too true. It was not that Holmes was boastful or arrogant, it was simply that he  believed in his own talent and abilities, and to overestimate or underestimate either would not be truthful or accurate. He was often obsessed with truth and accuracy. 

    He made it a point to study not only the history of crime but also recent criminal acts at home and abroad. Holmes personally stayed in contact with police detectives in several countries around the world—from Belgium to Brazil and from Cameroon to Canada. In his catalogue of crime, there were hundreds of modes of murder, robbery, kidnapping, confidence games, blackmail, forgery, and others. He went to great lengths to collect newspaper clippings of crimes and for each, he made comprehensive notes calling attention to certain details of the case. This would allow him to hear the features of a more recent crime, and make a conclusion based on the study of similar cases, not unlike a doctor who listens to the symptoms of a patient and accurately diagnoses the illness. But Holmes was not a doctor, nor was he a private detective; he was a consulting detective, perhaps the only one in the world. He was the man that detectives went to see when they were in a fog, or over their heads regarding a case. 

    To aid him in his work, Holmes studied human beings and was very aware of human foibles and vices, and things that motivated people. I would not classify Holmes as a lover, but he knew that love was a strong emotion that could easily lead a man or woman to perform acts they would not normally do if that emotion was not involved. Though he seldom demonstrated them himself, Holmes understood human emotions such as fear, vengefulness, hatred, and greed, and how these emotions led to criminal acts.

    He continually acquired vast amounts of specialized knowledge. Holmes would sometimes say; A man should keep his little brain-attic stocked with the furniture that he is likely to use, and the rest he can put away in the lumber-room of his library, where he can get it if he wants it.   

    However, Holmes had also once said that it was not possible for a man to possess all knowledge, so he endeavoured to store up a great deal of knowledge that aided him in his work. He was well up on human anatomy, chemistry, and psychology. He made a comprehensive study of tobacco ash, bicycle tires, printed type, handwriting, tattoos, old documents, and secret codes.

    But of course, he fell short of possessing all knowledge. Even the Encyclopedia Britannica did not possess all knowledge.

    It was early in May 1901 and Holmes, and I had just finished our lunch. It was a beautiful spring day, but the weather was of little interest to Holmes, who sat around restlessly in his mouse-coloured dressing gown, his gray eyes mere slits, and his chin sunk upon his chest. For months on end, the great detective had had little with which to scintillate his brilliant mind. ‘Trivialities and stagnation’ was the phrase he uttered almost daily. 

    “Nothing in the papers, Watson?” he said, his gaze fixed upon the ceiling. 

All of Stephen Gaspar's books can be found on Amazon!






Thursday, September 28, 2023

A Study in Scarlet

 This November will be the 136th anniversary of the first appearance of Sherlock Holmes in Print. A Study in Scarlet was published in Beeton's Christmas Annual in 1887. It is now a rare collectible and considered the most expensive magazine in the world, with 
Beeton's 1887 selling for $156,000 at Sotheby's in 2007. 

 Beeton's Christmas Annual was a paperback magazine published from 1860 (volume 1) through 1898 (volume 39).  Each issue also carried a distinctive title reflecting that season's contents.  The 1887 edition, entitled "A Study in Scarlet," was approximately 8.5" x 5.5" and had color pictorial wrappers (cover).  It was issued in November at a price of one shilling and sold out before Christmas.

A Study in Scarlet was the first Sherlock Holmes story, written in 1887 by 27-year-old Conan Doyle. 
Though Conan Doyle would go on to write 56 short stories of Holmes, A Study in Scarlet was the first of only four full-length novels the author would write.
Though not perhaps the most popular Sherlock Holmes story, A Study in Scarlet was the first and so deserves considerable consideration.
The story is divided into two parts. The first part introduces the reader to Holmes and Watson and a couple of murders. The second part tells the tale of what led to the murders. This formula would be repeated in The Sign of Four and The Valley of Fear, two other full-length stories. Most of Conan Doyle's short stories of Sherlock Holmes would also use this same formula to some extent.

My second Sherlock Holmes mystery, Cold-Hearted Murder is an homage to A Study in Scarlet; the first half of the story has Holmes and Watson investigating a series of bizarre murders in London, and the second half tells the remarkable story of what led up to these crimes. In A Study in Scarlet the backstory takes place in the American West, while in Cold-Hearted Murder the backstory is set during the Great Klondike Gold Rush in the Canadian North-West.


All of Stephen Gaspar's books can be found on Amazon! click here! 

Thursday, September 14, 2023

The Hound of the Baskervilles


Of the four novel-length Sherlock Holmes stories Sir Arthur Conan Doyle wrote, one stands out, and that one, I believe is The Hound of the Baskervilles (1902). The other three contain, in some cases, lengthy backstories where Holmes is absent. This absence from the story does not always sit well with Holmesians. When we read a Holmes story we expect… Holmes. 


To be honest, the Baskerville story does have a good portion of the story where Holmes is offstage, but I believe the author makes up for it rather well.

Before I get into the story I wish to inform the reader that I will not be quoting or referring to scholars who have studied the story much more than I. Rather, I will be focusing on Doyle’s story, his words, plotting, and setting.


Let me start with the beginning of the story, set in London c. 1889. Here is Holmes at his best from reconstructing Dr. Mortimer from his walking stick to some other great detective work; the warning letter to Sir Henry, the missing boot, trailing Sir Henry on the street, and the questioning of the cabman. All good stuff. This section also has the lengthy legend of the hound and the details of Sir Charles’s death. 


Now we come to the middle section which I estimate to be about ⅜ of the story. In lieu of Holmes’s absence, Doyle fills Dartmoor with a fine cast of characters, Dr. Mortimer and Sir Henry (whom we have already met). Watson says this about Sir Henry.

… how true a descendant he was of that long line of high-blooded, fiery, and masterful men. There were pride, valour, and strength in his thick brows, his sensitive nostrils, and his large hazel eyes. If on that forbidding moor a difficult and dangerous quest should lie before us, this was at least a comrade for whom one might venture to take a risk with the certainty that he would bravely share it.

Of Dr. Mortimer we know little, save for the fact that he is married, likes to dig up old skulls, and knows the details of Sir Charles's death.

There is the naturalist, Jack Stapleton,  … was neutral tinted, with light hair and grey eyes,… who exhibits … extraordinary energy and speed …


… and there is his sister [Beryl], who is said to be a young lady of attractions.she was darker than any brunette whom I have seen in England—slim, elegant, and tall. She had a proud, finely cut face, so regular that it might have seemed impassive were it not for the sensitive mouth and the beautiful dark, eager eyes. With her perfect figure and elegant dress she was, indeed, a strange apparition upon a lonely moorland path.


Another interesting pair is the dark, somewhat morose Barrymores, John, the watchful husband who suspiciously prowls the Hall late at night, and sad wife who was heard crying in the night. He was a remarkable-looking man, tall, handsome, with a square black beard and pale, distinguished features. And his wife Eliza. She is a heavy, solid person, very limited, intensely respectable, and inclined to be puritanical. The Barrymore family and the Baskervilles go back generations.


Mr. Frankland, of Lafter Hall, is an elderly man, red-faced, white-haired, and choleric. His passion is for the British law, and he has spent a large fortune in litigation. He fights for the mere pleasure of fighting and is equally ready to take up either side of a question, so that it is no wonder that he has found it a costly amusement. He is sometimes burned in effigy by villagers. Frankland is learned in old manorial and communal rights. He keeps a watchful eye on the moor with the telescope perched up on the roof of Lafter Hall.


The escaped convict lends a malevolence to the mystery. Selden committed a murder of peculiar ferocity … and the wanton brutality …. Somewhere there, on that desolate plain, was lurking this fiendish man, hiding in a burrow like a wild beast, his heart full of malignancy against the whole race which had cast him out. His appearance lived up to his reputation. ... an evil yellow face, a terrible animal face, all seamed and scored with vile passions. Foul with mire, with a bristling beard, and hung with matted hair, it might well have belonged to one of those old savages ... How could anyone feel safe on the moor?


Laura Lyons appears as a mysterious tragic character whom we discover more than half way through the story. She is another female character of extreme beauty. Her eyes and hair were of the same rich hazel colour, and her cheeks, though considerably freckled, were flushed with the exquisite bloom of the brunette, the dainty pink which lurks at the heart of the sulphur rose. Afterwards, Watson modifies his assessment. There was something subtly wrong with the face, some coarseness of expression, some hardness, perhaps, of eye, some looseness of lip which marred its perfect beauty. 


So there are our characters, all suspicious and hiding some deep, dark secret, but there is one more character, perhaps the most important of all, and that is the moor itself. Doyle’s description of the landscape is so vivid, that the moorland practically takes on a life of its own. Or, as Watson writes, The longer one stays here the more does the spirit of the moor sink into one’s soul, its vastness, and also its grim charm.   The moor is crucial in setting the mood and I do not believe the author ever duplicated it as well in any of his Holmes stories. 


Over the green squares of the fields and the low curve of a wood there rose in the distance a grey, melancholy hill, with a strange jagged summit, dim and vague in the distance, like some fantastic landscape in a dream.


Rolling pasture lands curved upward on either side of us, and old gabled houses peeped out from amid the thick green foliage, but behind the peaceful and sunlit countryside there rose ever, dark against the evening sky, the long, gloomy curve of the moor, broken by the jagged and sinister hills.


... we curved upward through deep lanes worn by centuries of wheels, high banks on either side, heavy with dripping moss and fleshy hart’s-tongue ferns. Bronzing bracken and mottled bramble gleamed in the light of the sinking sun. Still steadily rising, we passed over a narrow granite bridge and skirted a noisy stream which gushed swiftly down, foaming and roaring amid the grey boulders. Both road and stream wound up through a valley dense with scrub oak and fir. 


Our wagonette had topped a rise and in front of us rose the huge expanse of the moor, mottled with gnarled and craggy cairns and tors. A cold wind swept down from it and set us shivering.


The road in front of us grew bleaker and wilder over huge russet and olive slopes, sprinkled with giant boulders. Now and then we passed a moorland cottage, walled and roofed with stone, with no creeper to break its harsh outline.


It came with the wind through the silence of the night, a long, deep mutter, then a rising howl, and then the sad moan in which it died away. Again and again it sounded, the whole air throbbing with it, strident, wild, and menacing. 


Baskerville Hall itself created a certain ambiance that lent a certain gothic foreboding.


Through the gateway we passed into the avenue, where the wheels were again hushed amid the leaves, and the old trees shot their branches in a sombre tunnel over our heads. Baskerville shuddered as he looked up the long, dark drive to where the house glimmered like a ghost at the farther end.

Sir Henry uttered: “It’s enough to scare any man.


… we found ourselves, large, lofty, and heavily raftered with huge baulks of age-blackened oak. In the great old-fashioned fireplace behind the high iron dogs a log-fire crackled and snapped. Sir Henry and I held out our hands to it, for we were numb from our long drive. Then we gazed round us at the high, thin window of old stained glass, the oak panelling, the stags’ heads, the coats of arms upon the walls, all dim and sombre in the subdued light of the central lamp.


 Black beams shot across above our heads, with a smoke-darkened ceiling beyond them. With rows of flaring torches to light it up, and the colour and rude hilarity of an old-time banquet, it might have softened; but now, when two black-clothed gentlemen sat in the little circle of light thrown by a shaded lamp, one’s voice became hushed and one’s spirit subdued. A dim line of ancestors, in every variety of dress, from the Elizabethan knight to the buck of the Regency, stared down upon us and daunted us by their silent company.

Finally, Holmes makes a reappearance in the story, and we are relieved by his presence. He has secretly been on the moor practically the entire time. Loose ends are tied up and he solves the mystery. One could do worse than revisit The Hound of the Baskervilles even though Holmes is absent for a good part of the story. It is perhaps the most famous story in the canon.


If you haven’t seen my blog focusing on the points of interest on the moor around Baskerville Hall, here is the link. https://www.blogger.com/blog/post/edit/1111766123201786757/2802328256322348665

  





                                                                                                     

Thursday, August 24, 2023

Baskerville Hall & Grimpen

(Contains Spoilers!) 

 After Dr. Mortimer came to consult Sherlock Holmes on the death of Sir Charles Baskerville and the legend of the hound, Holmes "... sent down to Stamford’s for the Ordnance map of this portion of the moor...  I flatter myself that I could find my way about.” Using a similar map, I have labelled points of interest so we all may be as well familiarized with the moor as the London detective. The map can be found at the bottom of the page.

No. 1 Baskerville Hall If Sir Henry is correct, ...the same hall in which for five hundred years my people have lived, then circa 1400 AD would mark the hall's origin. Baskerville Hall sat in a cuplike depression, patched with stunted oaks and firs which had been twisted and bent by the fury of years of storm.  It had two high, narrow towers, wrought iron gates, with weather-bitten pillars on either side, blotched with lichens, and surmounted by the boars’ heads of the Baskervilles. In the front drive old trees shot their branches in a sombre tunnel over our heads ... The whole front was draped in ivy, with a patch clipped bare here and there where a window or a coat of arms broke through the dark veil.

No. 2 Yew Alley A well-known walkway lined with soft gravel eight feet across and a six-foot stretch of grass on each side. This alley was enclosed on each side with an impenetrable twelve-foot high yew hedge, "... with the moor, as you perceive, upon the right of it..." When Sir Henry first arrives at the main gate of Baskerville Hall, he looks up at the long dark drive and asks Dr. Mortimer, "Was it here?" in regards to where his uncle died. Mortimer replies, “No, no, the Yew Alley is on the other side.” 

No. 3  Wicket-gate or Moor-gate ... a white wooden gate with a latch ... is halfway down the Yew Alley and leads onto the moor. The gate was only four feet high... low enough for a large hound to leap over. It was here that Dr. Mortimer suggests that Sir Charles stood smoking a cigar on the fateful night of his death. "... Then, again, whom was he waiting for that night, and why was he waiting for him in the Yew Alley rather than in his own house?”

No. 4 Sir Charles's dead body was found near the end of the Yew Alley. "... Sir Charles lay on his face, his arms out, his fingers dug into the ground, and his features convulsed with some strong emotion..." It was determined that he ran from the gate to this spot. "... he ran with cries for help in the direction where help was least likely to be ...." Dr. Mortimer observed the marks of a great hound about twenty yards from  Sir Charles's body. The body lay fifty yards from ... an old tumble-down summer-house ... at the far end of Yew Alley.

No. 5 Lafter Hall The house of old Frankland the litigant, who lives four miles to the south of Baskerville Hall. From his telescope on the roof, Franklin could see a boy (Cartwright) taking supplies to someone (Holmes) at Black Tor.

No. 6 Merripit House "There is a house indicated here which may be the residence of the naturalist—Stapleton, if I remember right, was his name." Merripit House is a bleak moorland house, once the farm of some grazier in the old prosperous days, but now put into repair and turned into a modern dwelling. An orchard surrounded it, but the trees, as is usual upon the moor, were stunted and nipped, and the effect of the whole place was mean and melancholy. A wall and an outhouse sit out behind the house.                                  

No. 7 Grimpen "... This small clump of buildings here is the hamlet of Grimpen, where our friend Dr. Mortimer has his headquarters...."  Watson visited the postmaster in Grimpen. 

No. 8 Coombe Tracey Franklin's daughter, Laura Lyons lived and had a typewriting business in Coombe Tracey. Holmes stayed for the most part at Coombe Tracey while on the case, and only used the hut upon the moor when it was necessary to be near the scene of action.

No. 9 Black Tor A tor is a hill or rocky peak. Watson went to Black Tor to discover the stranger seen there. Holmes had a temporary hut on Black Tor to be close to Sir Henry and to keep an eye on Stapleton.

No. 10 Cleft Tor Is where Selden the convict was hiding, hardly a mile or two from Baskerville Hall where Barrymore signalled him with a candle in the window. Watson and Sir Henry went to Cleft Tor one night to capture Selden. It was then they heard a long, deep mutter, then a rising howl, and then the sad moan in which it died away. Again and again it sounded, the whole air throbbing with it, strident, wild, and menacing. Selden hurls a rock at them, and they pursue. The two see another man silhouetted against the moon. Selden likely lost his life near Cleft Tor.

No. 11 Prehistoric Settlement ... grey circular rings of stone, a score of them at least... they are the homes of our worthy ancestors...    “Neolithic man—no date.” Stapleton pointed out these stones to Watson while on the moor. Later Stapleton leads Sir Henry and Watson to this spot where Sir Hugo was to have met his end. ... a short valley between rugged tors ... stones, worn and sharpened at the upper end until they looked like the huge corroding fangs of some monstrous beast.

No. 12 Fernworthy A village that had little love for Franklin who thought nothing of closing off land where they liked to picnic. 

No. 13 Grimpen Mire A mire is swampy or boggy ground. “A false step yonder means death to man or beast...  It’s a bad place, the great Grimpen Mire... there are one or two paths which a very active man can take...” Stapleton kept the hound in an old tin mine at the centre of the mire, and the mire is where Stapleton met his end. Somewhere in the heart of the great Grimpen Mire, down in the foul slime of the huge morass which had sucked him in, this cold and cruel-hearted man is forever buried.

No. 14 The Hound Attacks Sir Henry  It was on this spot Sir Henry was attacked by the hound on the moor path. Sometime after 10 p.m., the Baronet left Merripit House and started off for home. A hound it was, an enormous coal-black hound, but not such a hound as mortal eyes have ever seen. Fire burst from its open mouth, its eyes glowed with a smouldering glare, its muzzle and hackles and dewlap were outlined in flickering flame. Never in the delirious dream of a disordered brain could anything more savage, more appalling, more hellish be conceived than that dark form and savage face which broke upon us out of the wall of fog. ...we heard scream after scream from Sir Henry and the deep roar of the hound. ... But the next instant Holmes had emptied five barrels of his revolver into the creature’s flank. ...The giant hound was dead.

 Ordnance map of the moor with additional notes


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